A couple years ago I posted the following set of Vehicle Design Rules for designing primitive Combat Vehicles and primitive Conventional fighters.

For the most part these rules manage to capture Age of War and Retrotech era vehicles rather closely. There are some off stats but most of the time the difference is normally minor and in my mind the end results are more consistent than using the Support Vehicle rules. Along those lines... Here are the rules... and just about every applicable vehicle and fighter from Age of War, XTRO Retrotech, and the three Primitives books.

Quirks can be found in the original books as not to piss off the Devs.

They are incompatible with the more advanced technology and construction techniques, such as omni-tech, exotic armor, advanced engines, and double heat sinks as the presence of such technology would make the unit cease to the "primitive". More advanced weapons (and accessories) are an exception and may be used as normal.

Step 2: Install Engines and Control SystemsThe following rule changes apply to Step 2 of Combat Vehicle (installing engines and control systems).

Install EngineThe Engine Rating of a Primitive Combat Vehicle is multiplied by 1.2 and the next available engine from the Master Engine Table is used.

Add Engines and Control SystemsDue to the greater bulk and lower technological sophistication of their systems, Primitive Combat Vehicles multiply their tonnage by 1.2, rounding up, when determining the tonnage of their internal structure. Also, because of more primitive life support, detection, and targeting electronics, Primitive Combat Vehicles add 1 ton to the mass of its control systems plus an addition half for every 20 tons of mass.

Add Lift/Dive Equipment or Rotors.Due to their more rutimentry technology, Primitive Combat Vehicles multiply their mass by 1.2 when determining the weight of their Lift/Dive Equipment or Rotors.

Step 3: Add ArmorArmor for Primitive Combat Vehicles is purchased in half-ton lots and is mounted using the standard limits for Combat Vehicles (see pp. 105-106, TM). They may mount Light, Medium, and Heavy Primitive Armor

Step 4: Add Additional HeatsinksLike modern Combat Vehicles, Primitives may only use single heat sinks and must have a number of heat sinks equal to the total energy weapons heat of the unit.

Step 5: Add Weapons, Ammunition and Other EquipmentPrimitive Combat Vehicles may add all weapons in accordance with Primitive Combat Vehicle design (pp. 107-109, TM). However, unless the vehicle is being constructed as "Retro-Tech", such items should be limited to those with an introduction date of 2400 or earlier in order to maintain period authenticity. After that time, engineering had progressed to the point that Combat Vehicles could be constructed using the standard rules for Combat Vehicle construction.

Choose Technology BaseAs with other Primitives, Primitive conventional fighters can only be built using Inner Sphere technology (see Primitive vs. Modern, pp. 144 JS:BD, for exceptions covering "Modern Primitive" designs). They are incompatible with the more advanced technology and construction techniques, such as omni-tech, exotic armor, advanced engines, and double heat sinks as the presence of such technology would make the unit cease to the "primitive". More advanced weapons (and accessories) are an exception and may be used as normal.

Step 2: Install Engines and Control SystemsThe following rule changes apply to Step 2 of conventional fighter design (installing engines and control systems).

Install EngineThe Engine Rating of a Primitive conventional fighter is multiplied by 1.2 and the next available engine (rounded up) from the Master Engine Table is used.

Add Control/Crew SystemsDue to the greater bulk and lower technological sophistication of their systems, Primitive aerospace fighters add 1 ton to the mass of its control systems plus an addition half for every 20 tons of mass; their cockpits functional identically to those of more advanced designs.

Step 3: Add ArmorArmor for Primitive conventional fighters is purchased in half-ton lots and is mounted using the standard limits for conventional fighters (see pp. 190-191, TM). They may mount Light, Medium, and Heavy Primitive Armor.

Step 4: Add Additional HeatsinksLike modern conventional fighters, Primitives may only use single heat sinks and must have a number of heat sinks equal to the total energy weapons heat of the unit.

Step 5: Add Weapons, Ammunition and Other EquipmentPrimitive conventional fighters may add all weapons in accordance with conventional fighters design (pp. 194-195, TM). However, unless the fighter is being constructed as "Retro-Tech", such items should be limited to those with an introduction date of 2400 or earlier in order to maintain period authenticity. After that time, engineering had progressed to the point that conventional fighters could be constructed using the standard rules for conventional fighter construction.

Conversion Notes: It trades some armor for an extra machine gun in the nose and a half-ton of ammo due to conventional fighter armor limits. A suggested modification to make it... well... combat effective would be to trade the second MG, extra ammo, and the Rocket Laucher for an SRM2 and a ton of ammo. Or trade all the weapons for an LRM5.

Note: This one was a bit of a bear to convert over due to the sheer size of the 300 SFE needed to give it a full 5/8 movement profile. Out of all the vehicles it is fartherest from the TRO and the ultimate proof that while these rules are pretty good, they ain't perfect. Statted as it is in the TRO, the tank would be a full 6 tons over the limit. As the other option was to strip it of most of its armor and weapons, I chose to bring its sets to be more in line with the advanced version. Compared to the other tanks of the era it is pretty powerful, but I guess in the land of ICE vehicles with BAR7 armor, the fast fusion tank with the 8 Damage Laser cannon is king!

Note: Well, this one tooksome work. First it had to be dropped in mass by 10 tons to be legal. Second, it had to lose a lot of mass due to the mass of the 300 Fusion engine. Then armor had to be removed, again, to make it legal. That left me with almost 5 tons to burn on something... so put it into small lasers. Not perfect but sometimes you do what you must.

I'll be interested to play with them. My sort of "home faction" is a planetary militia that uses home-built conventional vees, and this might work "better" for my purposes than the regular conventional combat vehicle rules. Have you playtested any of this? Discovered any balance issues?

I'll be interested to play with them. My sort of "home faction" is a planetary militia that uses home-built conventional vees, and this might work "better" for my purposes than the regular conventional combat vehicle rules. Have you playtested any of this? Discovered any balance issues?

Haven't had the chance myself but others have, and the rules were specifically designed to try and get them as close as reasonably possible to the vehicles designated in the official rules.

Though I will admit, Fusion engines can break them a bit. In the smaller size classes they're too light and when you get larger that extra 20% rating can lead to some issues, like the Korvin.

Still, it does a rather good job about 80% of the time and in my book that's okay.

I've read both your rules & looked at the TRO's & I'm very impressed at the hard work you've put into this O0 , unfortunately I'm with out a gaming group / partner at present so I cannot give any gaming feed back which this really deserves.

Khan, Clan Iron DolphinAzeroth PocketverseThat is, if true tanker doesn't beat me to it. He makes truly evil units. ~ Col.Hengist on 31 May 2013TT, we know you are the master of nasty O0 ~ Fletch on 22 June 2013If I'm attacking you, conventional wisom says to bring 3x your force. I want extra insurance, so I'll bring 4 for every 1 of what you have ~ Tai Dai Cultist on 21 April 2016Me: Would you rather fight my Epithymía Thanátou from the Whispers of Blake?Nav_Alpha: That THING... that is horrid ~ Nav_Alpha on 10 October 2016

Quick question, anybody who's good with PDFs be willing to put this into a TRO format?

I don’t now about good, and it sure ain’t gonna be pretty, but I’m working on this now. I’m finding a lot of things in the stats that make me say ‘ ’, but they’re going into the document as you crafted them. That said, I don’t have a tool to create record sheets, so it’ll just be the text stat-blocks for the time being.

I don’t now about good, and it sure ain’t gonna be pretty, but I’m working on this now. I’m finding a lot of things in the stats that make me say ‘ ’, but they’re going into the document as you crafted them. That said, I don’t have a tool to create record sheets, so it’ll just be the text stat-blocks for the time being.

I honestly meant to post this to the boards months ago, and I can’t offer any good reasons (or even bad excuses) for why it didn’t happen. Nonetheless, here it is, in all its glory bare-bones useability.

Long time since this one saw any activity, huh? Well, I’ve recently started chipping away at the remaining designs from the Primitives series, which has seen another volume since I posted the compiled pdf, and I might as well post them in this thread as I go.

Conversion Notes: The LTV-4 appears to have been built under the standard CV rules (barring the ‘Prototype’-grade standard armour), so I decided I’d tackle the earlier version.The fluff says the LTV-2’s older, softer armour was vulnerable to ‘most modern weapons’, so I considered going with BAR5 Light Primitive armour, but it would’ve given half-again the raw armour thickness. The large laser was also mandated by the fluff. The VGL is my own addition just to use up a stray half-ton, but I figure smoke grenades would’ve given crews some (welcome) added concealment against hostile gunners.

Conversion Notes: Matching the armour resulted in a higher BAR than the canonical design, but the same layout. This is another case where I threw on a VGL to use up a ‘spare’ half-ton, but another MG would’ve worked just as well.

Conversion Notes: Had to trim the fuel down by a half ton due to it coming in lots 1 ton, and the armor was reduced due to the Conventional rules, but hey, it can into bombs and drop tanks now so its not a total loss!

Conversion Notes: An 80 Ton Conventional Fighter? Seriously, what the f#&@, guys? The Vendetta being 10 tons over? Annoying but manageable. But seriously guys. Seriously. Normally these conversions end up within a couple tons of target, but this time... I had to trim 30 tons off it. First, it's speed suffered greatly. Which does fit the fluff as it was mentioned as being a piss poor dog fighter. Second, had to take a chainsaw to the armor due to rules. Third, had to cut down the wing mounted racks from 4 racks to 2 racks.

Khan, Clan Iron DolphinAzeroth PocketverseThat is, if true tanker doesn't beat me to it. He makes truly evil units. ~ Col.Hengist on 31 May 2013TT, we know you are the master of nasty O0 ~ Fletch on 22 June 2013If I'm attacking you, conventional wisom says to bring 3x your force. I want extra insurance, so I'll bring 4 for every 1 of what you have ~ Tai Dai Cultist on 21 April 2016Me: Would you rather fight my Epithymía Thanátou from the Whispers of Blake?Nav_Alpha: That THING... that is horrid ~ Nav_Alpha on 10 October 2016